Shiv Visvanathan is senior fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), Delhi. An anthropologist
and Human Rights researcher his work has explored the question of alternatives as a dialogue between the West
and India. Closely linked to his current work is the attempt to demystify the modern science and social knowledge
as legitimising categories of organised violence and exploitation. His writings have explored the psychological,
cultural and political relations of science; the growing control of society by technology; and linkages between
scientific establishment and authoritarian structures of state.

His work on the aftermath of the Bhopal Gas disaster and his current position against the nuclear celebration
in India and Pakistan are an extension of his search for alternatives to modern scientific, especially
bio-environmental practices and theories, and dialogue of traditional knowledge systems of knowledge
outside the mainstream of public sphere, leading to innovative ways of mutual learning. His latest publication
Foul Play: Chronicles of Corruption 1947-1997 is an attempt to look at corruption as an impetus for
state-building in India. He is currently working on the semiotics of the emerging Indian middle class in
India and the relation between energy systems and justice.

"Atomic Physics: The Career of an Imagination", Alternatives, 10(2), June 1984. Also published in Ashis Nandy (ed.) Science, Hegemony and Violence, (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988).

1987

"From the Annals of the Laboratory State", Alternatives,12(1), January 1987. Also published in Ashis Nandy (ed.), Science, Hegemony and Violence (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988). Also published in Lokayan Bulletin, 3(4-5), 1985 (translated from Finnish).

"Ancestors and Epigones: Environmentalism in India", Seminar (330), February 1987 (translated into Malayalam).

"From Laboratory to Industry: A Case Study in Transfer of Technology", Contributions to Indian Sociology, 2(1), 1977. Also published in Satish Saberwal (ed.), Process and Institution in Urban India (New Delhi: Vikas, 1978).

Projects Undertaken

"Science, Technology and Medicine in India". Sponsor: IDRC (Canada)

"The Bhopal Gas Disaster, A Study of the Aftermath". Sponsor: Holdeen Foundation (USA)

"An Information Unit on Militarization and Demilitarization in Asia". Sponsor: United Nations University